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"CT State Union Employees vote to lay off 7,500 workers"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------"HARTFORD â€” Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Friday that he was moving "full steam ahead'' with plans to lay off 7,500 state employees, as leaders of the AFSCME union announced that their members had officially rejected a savings and concession deal that would have given them layoff protection for four years.

The administration has ruled out a renegotiation with the unions because the multi-faceted agreement took months of intense negotiations and compromises to complete. Malloy said he and his budget team intend to release layoff notices "as soon as possible'' to balance the budget."

Union leaders STRONGLY urged their members to ratify this deal or massive layoffs would result. All they had to do to guarantee no layoffs was to go without a raise for 2 years. If they voted to pass it, NO ONE would have been laid off.

Most unions are making concessions to save the jobs of the rank and file, this move defies logic.... unless there is more to the story.

Click to expand...

From the article,
>>>>>There were widespread reports that many of the "no'' voters were older state employees who wanted to preserve their lucrative benefits and knew they would not be laid off because they have seniority. Malloy conceded that some state workers clearly believed that they would not lose their jobs because of "bumping rights'' that protects the older workers with seniority.<<<<<<<

"HARTFORD â€” Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Friday that he was moving "full steam ahead'' with plans to lay off 7,500 state employees, as leaders of the AFSCME union announced that their members had officially rejected a savings and concession deal that would have given them layoff protection for four years.

The administration has ruled out a renegotiation with the unions because the multi-faceted agreement took months of intense negotiations and compromises to complete. Malloy said he and his budget team intend to release layoff notices "as soon as possible'' to balance the budget."

Union leaders STRONGLY urged their members to ratify this deal or massive layoffs would result. All they had to do to guarantee no layoffs was to go without a raise for 2 years. If they voted to pass it, NO ONE would have been laid off.

From the article,
>>>>>There were widespread reports that many of the "no'' voters were older state employees who wanted to preserve their lucrative benefits and knew they would not be laid off because they have seniority. Malloy conceded that some state workers clearly believed that they would not lose their jobs because of "bumping rights'' that protects the older workers with seniority.<<<<<<<

It's a bit disingenious to focus on "older workers" as the cause when the article cited clearly also lists two other possible reasons for the vote-down and only says that all three reasons were "possibilities" but that nothing was confirmed.

Insiders said the unions clearly got outmaneuvered in the fast-moving world of e-mails, blogs and web sites that generated a huge amount of information about the deal. The union spokesmen said the disinformation was particularly targeted to the prison guards and did not reach the university professors in great numbers.

One of the biggest issues that was spread through e-mails was that the state employees' healthcare benefits would be merged into the state's SustiNet health care plan. Even though Malloy had rejected that theory long ago, he said Friday that some state employees clearly did not listen to his statements.

The Hartford-based Yankee Institute on Friday again responded to allegations that it has been running a massive disinformation campaign to shoot down the agreement. The unions are charging that the Yankee Institute is an anti-union, anti-worker "corporate front group'' that is seeking to kill the deal and has been opposing union issues for years.

But Fergus Cullen, the executive director of the institute, says the charges are baseless and preposterous. He wrote to the state auditors to seek an expedited investigation into the charges that the small institute had hacked into the state employees' e-mail system to spread the disinformation about the SustiNet health care plan.

Besides blaming the conservative Yankee Institute think tank for pushing against the deal, the unions charged that even managers at the state Department of Transportation were advocating against ratification.

"We heard reports that managers were telling employees: 'Don't vote to ratify this. You're safe. You're fine. Don't worry about it,' '' Dorman said. "And that had an effect, too. Not just in DOT but in other agencies, too.'' A department spokesman could not be reached for comment.

Let me be clear about Malloy, This man has put Stamford, CT into Millions of dollars of debt, on top of stealing millions of dollars from stamford tax payers. This man is taxing EVERYTHING he possibly can here in CT. He is taxing hospitals as well. So, if you need to go to the hospital in CT, i would go to another state. He wants to put tolls up. UBS is moving out of stamford because Malloy raising the corporate tax. Not only is he raising taxes on CT taxpayers, but he is also killing jobs. He is to CT as to what Obama is to the USA!!